Zynga has formally shuttered Echtra Games, the event studio behind Torchlight 3, which had been engaged on an unannounced cross-platform ARPG within the 4 years since its acquisition.
IGN can affirm the San Francisco-based studio can be shut down by the tip of the month. While we don't have an precise quantity of people impacted, LinkedIn has 61 people who list their current job at the studio.
Zynga has offered the next assertion to IGN:
Zynga has made the tough determination to stop operations at its Echtra studio, ending growth on future titles and lowering roles. This determination is an element of a strategic realignment of the corporate's sources and priorities. We will work intently with impacted staff so they’re handled with the utmost respect and consideration as we navigate this tough course of.
Echtra Games was based by Max Schaefer, one of the co-founders of Torchlight developer Runic Games, and previously a co-founder of Blizzard North and co-creator of Diablo. Schaefer left Runic after his fellow co-founders equally departed the studio, and based Echtra beneath investor Perfect World to work on a Torchlight MMO. Over time, the game's imaginative and prescient shifted, finally changing into Torchlight Frontiers and later Torchlight 3. In 2021, Echtra Games was acquired by Zynga, leaving Torchlight 3 within the palms of Perfect World and beginning work on "a new, yet to be announced RPG for cross-platform play" alongside CSR Racing and Star Wars: Hunters developer NaturalMotion.
Unfortunately, Echtra Games' RPG was by no means introduced or proven. It is unclear exactly why Echtra was shuttered, although its closure comes simply three months after Zynga introduced it would shut down NaturalMotion-developed Star Wars: Hunters later this 12 months — a determination that was itself introduced simply 9 months after the game launched. Notably, Zynga is a subsidiary of Grand Theft Auto writer Take-Two Interactive, which slowly dismantled after which sold off its Private Division publishing label earlier this 12 months. The writer additionally laid off around 5% of its workforce just over a year ago and canceled a number of initiatives.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can discover her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to [email protected].